So, you just bought Primal Carnage. You boot it up for the first time and just got done playing your first match. You team lost having only 352 kills to the enemies 500 kills. You amazingly walked away with Two kills, 63 deaths, and nine assists. You thought that scientist surrounded by six pyros was a good target, but that just got you killed real quickly. Well, you're here cause you want to be the clever girl that takes out all 7 people, and that's what you're going to learn how to do.

If you've seen Jurassic Park you probably already know what a raptor is, so we'll move on to what exactly is the Primal Carnage raptor. The PC raptor is pretty much the assault class of the game. The majority of people on your team are going to be raptors, but it is your goal to stand out from the rest, so to start we're going to go over the basics of the class.

Claws:This is your primary mouse button. What this does is swipes your claws in front of you. It does about 45 damage a swipe which means it only takes four swipes to kill someone at full health.

Pounce:This is your secondary mouse button and your main attack. What this does is it uses up about 35-40% of your stamina to lunge in front of you. When you hit someone with this, they'll be pinned and will be take 19 damage every half second. it takes 3 1/2 seconds to kill someone at full health.
The pounce ends when either 1) the opponent dies, 2)The raptor jumps to get off 3)The raptor takes one hp of damage, or 4)The raptor runs out of stamina causing him to stop and the target to get free.

"What not to do"

Jumping: An extremely important part of being a raptor. If you've played human you know how hard it is to hit a raptor jumping around. Use jumping to maneuver around a person to slash them or use it to get away.

Roar:All dinosaurs have a roar and raptors are no different. Some people think that the raptor's roar is useless, but those people don't know how to use it. What the raptor's roar does is that it drains ALL stamina you currently have, stops the production of any new stamina, and increases your clawing speed by 100-200% for the short duration. During this time you can not run or jump, this is meant for the raptor to get in to a fray of many people and to start doing damage. Has a long cool down.

Running:Just like the others a raptor can run to. This makes the raptor extremely fast but eats up a lot of the raptors slowly regenerating stamina. I don't recommend running that often, but when you do I use the golden rule of don't go below 60-70% stamina. Use running mostly to catch up with an enemy running away.

Jumping:Jumping is not just good for getting to higher locations, it's also great for escaping and advancing upon your target. It's harder to hit a dinosaur in the air than on the ground.

Heal on Kill:It's important to know that every time you kill someone you heal a small portion of your health, it doesn't matter if it's from clawing or pouncing, you still heal.

Now that we've gone over the basic abilities it's time to go into strategy.

Think of the raptor as a hunter in left 4 dead except you're closer to the ground, kill faster, and can jump off at will. The pounce is your main weapon. You can you use to kill, you can use it as a form of crowd-control, or you use it as a distraction. A good raptor will use it for all three.

Most of the time you'll be playing Deathmatch and the key is to get at least 1 more kill then your total deaths to be a credit to the team. Your main targets are going to be people that are alone, weather they just spawned, decided to go Rambo, or they were the sickly deer that fell behind, these are your best and easiest targets. They rarely have someone save them.

Working in groups is the best thing to do as a raptor. A raptor's best environment is chaos. Although, since the game doesn't have voice chat it can be hard to coordinate, but players still do it anyway by basically following other especially bigger dinosaurs. Humans tend to focus on the bigger dinosaurs which gives you a great opportunity to pounce someone and not get knocked off, or rush in clawing.

As I'll mention in the video later in the guide, you want other dinosaurs to help you get kills, and by extension you want to help them. If you pounce a human and a T-rex eats them, a carno charges them, or another raptor scratches them, then you still get the kill and they get an assist. If you see another raptor with someone pinned, you should go and help them by scratching their target, since it does additional damage and gets that raptor off sooner and ready for their next target. If you get knocked of your target by a bullet you can either retreat if you won't win or try slashing them to death.

Roaring is useful when you're out of stamina and/or need to go into a large group of people. Remember, you can't attack WHILE roaring but afterwards you have the attack speed boost. Try to do it as a last resort or if a group of humans is being attacked by a couple other or at least 1 bigger dinosaur.

When you pounce always be watching two things
1)Your stamina bar since you'll be knocked off if you reach zero and the target will be free.
2)Pan your camera to make sure no one is approaching you or are about to help their pinned teammate.
If you get knocked either retreat or decide if you want to finish the target off with a scratch.

As you know there are five classes in the game, which I will now break down strategies to use against them and what to watch for. The classes will be listed from highest threat to least.

1)Pyro:The pyro is going to be your biggest threat due to his arsenal of anti-pounce tools. The flamethrower is brutally powerful. His chainsaw is alone extremely strong and will keep you off, and his grenades are a 1 hit kill at he hits you with it, otherwise it still does heavy damage.
When fighting a pyro, it's best to try pouncing him from the sides or back. Clawing at him should only be done from behind. The afterburn from the flamethrower is a joke so don't even worry about it. Make sure when he's facing you, you stay out of his flamethrowers range, and hop around and retreat if he pulls his grenades out. Never pounce a pyro shooting his flame straight at you.

2)Pathfinder:Personally I think the pathfinder is an overpowered class. The shotgun is too strong and the reload speed(the only downside) is barely a downside, put together with flares which are the strongest gimmick of any class makes the pathfinder good against any dinosaur, but I'm here to talk strategy. With that in mind that's what you're going to be face for the second biggest threat. The shotgun is an instant kill at full health up close, and can do some serious damage at mid range. Going into flares is a big no-no unless there's other dinosaurs in the area and you know the numbers you're going against. Scratching can be risky, but it's not as dangerous as say a pyro as long as you keep moving around. You can be killed mid-pounce with the shotgun so be careful pouncing from the front.

3)Commando:The commando is the human's assault class. He has a machine gun with a 60 round clip and three chamber grenades which have to be reloaded after each shot. The machine gun does serious damage, and can be used at long range to free a pounce(be careful to watch for this when you pounce someone). The grenade is exactly like the pyros, although not spammable. It will 1 hit you at close range and commandos like using them to free pounce victims. It also has a very long reload time on it.. Don't try 'counting shots' with his machine gun because usually 30 shots will feels like 60. Be careful slashing him cause he can do some serious damage, pouncing can be done from the front, but expect to take quite a bit of damage.

4)Trapper:Now we're getting into the area of your easy targets. The trapper has two weapons, his dual pistols and his net gun. Trappers are EXTREMELY easy to read and are pretty much robotic. When there's a trapper in the area what he'll do is walk straight toward you, shoot his net, and if he gets you, he'll immediately walk straight toward you to knife you. Once you play about 20 hours of Primal Carnage you'll be able to tell when they're about to shoot their net. This is especially handy when you've pounced someone cause he'll run straight for you to net, and you just jump off the target and over the net, and go after the trapper with claws. Also you can always let another dinosaur go and get netted first then pounce him as he heads straight for his target for a knife kill. Make sure you watch trappers when you're playing so you can observe and learn this behavior. Also make sure you're jumping around when you're trying to approach a trapper to avoid his net.
As for his pistols, they are extremely dangerous and empty quick. It's easy to attack a trapper during a reload.

5)Scientist: Almost felt like ranking a pile of dinosaur poop as five and scientist as six. Scientists are nothing short of a joke. While the pathfinder is overpowered, the scientist is underpowered and played by scrubs usually. The scientists has zero anti-raptor defense and will spend most of their time tunnel visioned into their scope. These are extremely easy scratch kills. If you see one alone do try to pounce them cause their rifle is still a threat. If aimed properly the sniper rifle can be a two hit kill. You can try counting shots, but most the time the scientist will be dead from claws before they run out of their seven shots. The tranquilizer is nothing short of a joke. It takes almost three full clip to kill a raptor, and the dizzy effect is barely noticeable. Just be careful to watch your stamina after getting hit cause it will be drained. Don't run into a situation expecting to be able to pounce if you just got tranqed.

Aside from knowing who you're going against, it's also smart to get an idea of what you're going against, so here I'm going to explain the deathmatch maps and go over a few strategies with them. I wish I could do a lot of pictures here with a great overhead view, but sadly only found one for dock.

1)Docks:This is personally my favorite map. Although this map lacks foliage it makes up for it with cover and lots of area for the humans to wander off into. To the left I got a map with all important spots marked off. Most the time you'll be spawning at A. This is both a dinosaur and human spawn. This is an easy place to get solo humans. Also the best corpse to feed on is here. Not a whole lot happens at B. There's an ammo crate here and sometimes you'll get a stray human. Don't focus on this area, but keep an eye on it for easy kills.
C is an amazing ambush place. The wall between C and D keeps people separates and also you can go inside the dark building when humans use as a shortcut. Also there's an ammo crate on the top of the C on the map. This is the ammo crate used by most humans. D is where humans camp 90% of the time. There is a medkit with sandbags that surround it here. T-Rexes can't fit in the sandbags so the medkits safe from them. Only attack D when there's a huge attack going on, otherwise pick off stray humans around it at B,C,F, and G. E is a big open area with a medkit that sometimes you'll find small groups holding out around. This is a good place to attack, also humans can spawn near here. I only put F on the map to point out that there's a building here that humans especially scientists like to get on and shoot from, easy to jump up here. G is an open area to and from D which is a great place to get solo people.
Now the three buildings between D,F, and G are all open, empty, and have brushy alleys between them. This makes for easy pounces where your target will get no help. H and I are just on the map to show that this is where most T-Rexes and carnos will spawn, humans are rarely seen here.

2)Utility Base:I hate this map and absolutely refuse to play it since it's extremely broken and in the humans favor, plus there's a exploit where humans can jump on the lights in the center building and get a clear shot to dinosaur spawn, which at least one person always seems to exploit. I recommend staying away from this map if possible. Near A is where the dinosaurs mostly spawn. Humans will rarely leave the center building and will almost never leave the walls, so the forest isn't in the shot. B is where most stray humans will be, but be careful as C usually has a lot of people watching. C is the archway entrance to the main base. T-Rexes can't fit inside the base and carnos have a hard time navigating in it. Also this is wear the light exploit comes into effect, they can easily shoot you while coming in from A, and can knock a T-rex down to 50% in one commando clip.
D is where most humans will be, up on the catwalk, extremely risky to go in or up here. E covers two things the roof and the inside of that building. The roof is an easy target since most times it'll be no more than three people. The inside the building is also good cause it's open spaces and bigger dinosaurs can patrol it. There's a medket at F which is a good target, but tends to get support from G. G is basically the ground level there's a cubbyhole there that the bigger dinosaurs can't reach and small groups like to camp in. H is an ammo kit, and a good spot to pounce since the humans don't have a whole lot of support here. I is another medkit that stealthier players like to use.

3)Airbase:The pictures I got for this were nothing less than awful, but they show the main areas. This map is really good for dinosaurs because it's night and hard to see, and there is A LOT of foliage to hide you pounces. A and B are a good hold out for humans, there's a medkit at B and a ammo crate at A that the humans like to camp. C is a good spot to pounce solo people. D is the inside of the hangar, so humans like to hangout in here which is a pretty bad idea since it is extremely hard to see in here. Also there's a corpse to eat on in here. E is usually where the humans will hold up, there's a medkit here and two fences that they use to protect from carno charges.
F is another camping spot for humans, that's the helipad. Carnos and T-rexes have an easy time getting here and as a raptor you can use the chaos to go in and get some easy kills. G is a good spot to find humans that just spawned. Since it is dark and covered in bushes you can get some easy pounces here.






4)Snowbound:This was another map that was hard to get screenshotted. I got 66% of the map in these 2 screenshots, while the other 33% is the dinosaur spawn that humans normally don't go near. A lot of servers seems to have this map removed from the rotation, never figured out why. This map doesn't have a whole lot of foliage so you'll stick out like a sore thumb. Humans normally spawn around A and B, and they also normally stick around this area, so it can be a good area to pick of stragglers. There's an ammo crate hiding behind the rock at C. A lot of solo people go here to restock, a good time to pounce them. Eating the corpse here can be extremely dangerous so use caution. D is normally where the majority of humans will be. There's a medkit here, so make sure they're not healing up. When fighting tends to drag on, humans normally wander to E in small groups. You can get some pounces here, but most of the time you'll need to claw. Sometimes Humans will also group up a little south of D, but there's enough rocks here to give you quite a bit of cover. Be careful because humans like to get on top of the cliff at E, and they are hard to attack.

5)Forest Chasm:My video on gameplay in the next section is played on forest chasm, which gives quite a few tips. This map is covered in foliage so it's easy to ambush people. There's two parts of this map the southern half (first picture) and the northern half (second picture). 90% of the fight will take place on the southern half. Dinosaurs spawn mostly off the map near A, which makes A a good spot to get some ambushes. B,C, and D are always big camping spots for humans. If the majority of humans are at one of these the other two are great pouncing spots. Bigger Dinosaurs have great access to these areas so it's easy to take advantage of the chaos. There's a medkit at D that's right next to some foliage, so it can be easy to ambush the people trying to heal.
There's a corpse at E that is the primary spot to heal since humans are always nearby, but it can be kind of risky if they're all at D. F,G, and H are the northern side of the map, which most the time you'll only find a few stragglers. F is where you'll find all humans if they decide to go on this side of the map. Sometimes a person or two can be found a G, also there's a corpse to eat here. H is a set of giant metal doors which every once in a while a group will try to camp.

6)The Falls:I only included a few screenshots of this once cause these three places are the only areas that humans will stick around. The inside of the dome is covered in foliage so humans know not to stay in it. They'll usually be found near the two big archways or near the cargo storage river. A is the first archway, there's a ammo crate right there, along with a medkit at B. The medkit isn't usually heavily guarded so you can get some easy pounces here. When attacking A it's recommended to wait for some bigger dinosaurs so you can attack in the chaos. Humans like to camp the ramp around A cause dinosaurs will throw themselves into the river easily. C is the second archway that they like to camp. This spot isn't as open as A so it's going to get less support from other camping areas. Like A you should wait for bigger dinosaurs to stir up chaos. D is an ammo crate and a feeding corpse. People getting ammo are easy targets, but be careful feeding since E has a clear view of it. The majority of people will be at E, they're usually all over the place so sometimes you can get a good hidden pounce due to the cargo boxes. Like A and C attack E with other dinosaurs. F is a medkit that's somewhat hidden so it's easy to hide behind the building and get people here. G is a huge spawn for T-rexes so you'll almost always have aid. H is right next to E, some humans are always camping here since T-rexes can't get under the small archway and carnos have a hard time navigating it. There is an ammo crate here, and like the other camping spots try to go in with other dinosaurs. On this map you really have to stick with the bigger dinosaurs or get people wandering around inside the dome.







7)Marsh: This map is extremely in favor of the dinosaurs. It's easy for the dinosaurs to group up here and rape train their way through the map. It's easy to find lone humans on this map which makes easy pounces. A is the center of the map and where the two main feeding corpses are. A is the center of the map and covered in tall grass. Any human that's in the grass is an easy kill and needs to be kicked till they go and watch the field raptor scene from The Lost World. B is where most humans are going to group up. There's a medkit and ammo crate near each other along with open space so most humans will hang out here. C is another place humans will hang out, and just like B it has a medkit and ammo crate nearby, although it's not as open. Most humans at C will stay near the rock formation.
There's a medkit at D and a spawn for humans. You can get easy pounces here or find a small group. E and F is basically the left half of the map. This is an easy pounce location since there's quite a bit of foliage. There's a medkit at G, sometimes small groups will hide here since their backs to a cliff.

So, here are at what I consider to be the best part of the guide. I'm not a reading learning, I have to watch someone play in order to learn. Below is a 30 minute video of me playing raptor on Forest Chasm. I narrate over the entire thing, and it shows some good gameplay with some tips and tricks on how to play raptor and how to play raptor on Forest Chasm.
I really recommend that you read the trapper part of Meet the Classes first cause I absolutely forgot to mention that robot type patterns they do in the video (recorded six narrations and this was the final one). Also there's annotations on the first 30 seconds for a huge tip on pouncing. Also it's avaliable in 1080p.


Well thanks for reading and/or watching, hope you learned how to be the best raptor you can be.